What are your thoughts & opinions on the realism movement going on with comic covers?books today? 1 1

[FSF]

1 minute ago, TwoPiece said:

I already did that via the bolded.

The answer is up to the respondent and is entirely an opinion based situation so I still don't know why it's so difficult to express one's opinion on the matter.

[theCapraAegagrus]

1 minute ago, FSF said:

The answer is up to the respondent and is entirely an opinion based situation so I still don't know why it's so difficult to express one's opinion on the matter.

This is so irrelevant.

"I can't even..."

[jason4]

I like this topic and I am on the side of embracing the realistic direction of art as of late. Check out this new art for DCeased coming fro. Shannon Maer:

I also like the fact that it's a not overly sexualized depiction of harley for once.

[bc]

15 minutes ago, FSF said:

The point of the thread is very simple.  Do you like the increasing new style of art or not?  I suppose that as an extension of that is whether it is even appropriate to consider it comic art at this point though this part was not obvious.  Beyond that, there is no objective or agenda or any other consideration.  I'm just curious what the audience thinks of this pretty significant shift in what is being defined as "comic art."  As far any notion that I'm upset, that is completely absurd.  Feel free to post whatever you want and lots of threads get derailed so I get that and am guilty of it myself from time to time but I still don't understand this need to focus on the stories and even more so, the talk of "captions" as if there were that many books that actually even used them on the cover even before the modern era.  And regarding any sort of notion that I think Artgerm or any other books that I buy are going to be valuable is completely laughable.  I'm well entrenched in the camp that thinks that virtually all comic books will be essentially worthless sometime before i die.  I'm in my mid 40s if that helps.  I don't do comics, or any collectibles, for money.

Hi FSF,

The use of cover captions has been a part of comics since the earliest days of the medium. Captions are like promo's - they gave the potential buyer a glimpse of the underlying story contained inside in the hopes of luring a sale.

If the cover didn't have a caption, it was typically a "battle" scene depicting the hero and the villain engaged in glorious combat. Again, this was an attempt to appeal to the potential buyer among a background of dozens (maybe a hundred) other comics on the stands at the same time. It was all about maximizing sales.

If the industry has shifted toward realistic character poses on the covers (some have noted how it resembles the old Pin-up pages) - the market will ultimately decide whether they like it or not.

I do not buy modern books, so I have no horse in the race.

-bc

 

 

 

[Aweandlorder]

Isn't it simpler to just call them painted covers? Even though most ore computer generated today they still are considered painted because of their painted texture. 

Painted covers were huge in the golden-silver era with Gold Key/Dell books and of course occupied most pulps even before then. They weren't as prominent in the 70s and much less in the 80s/ early 90s (I can only think of Steve Rude and Dave Doorman as painted cover artists in that era)

Theres nothing new about them. It's definitely a plus

[valiantman]

8 minutes ago, Aweandlorder said:

Isn't it simpler to just call them painted covers? Even though most ore computer generated today they still are considered painted because of their painted texture. 

Painted covers were huge in the golden-silver era with Gold Key/Dell books and of course occupied most pulps even before then. They weren't as prominent in the 70s and much less in the 80s/ early 90s (I can only think of Steve Rude and Dave Doorman as painted cover artists in that era)

Theres nothing new about them. It's definitely a plus

56 years ago...

...and a back cover pin-up...

...and this is what the story is about on the pages inside. 

Edited April 22, 2019 by valiantman

[F For Fake]

18 hours ago, VintageComics said:

I think the bigger problem is that covers don't tie into the stories. They're poster pieces to themselves.

I think I'd like captions back on comic book covers.

This, 100%

Comic book covers look like mini-posters these days. They do practically nothing to sell the story inside. I'm assuming this is a symptom of the encapsulation age of comics collecting.

As for the artwork itself, most of it leaves me cold. So much of it is (or at least appears to be) digitally created, or at least computer assisted. Does nothing for me.

[FSF]

4 minutes ago, Aweandlorder said:

Isn't it simpler to just call them painted covers? Even though most ore computer generated today they still are considered painted because of their painted texture. 

Painted covers were huge in the golden-silver era with Gold Key/Dell books and of course occupied most pulps even before then. They weren't as prominent in the 70s and much less in the 80s/ early 90s (I can only think of Steve Rude and Dave Doorman as painted cover artists in that era)

Theres nothing new about them. It's definitely a plus

This is what I was wondering about.  Beyond whether one likes it or not, Is it even fair or appropriate to think of these covers as "comic art?"

Because once again, this is not  about the stories inside the book. That issue exists whether we want to talk about these realistic covers or the endless amount of traditional comic art covers so once again, the conflating of these matters is pretty confusing.  One issue has nothing to do with the other as I see it.

 

[valiantman]

Can you imagine what price this book would get if it was an "Artgerm variant" from 2019?

It's just a Batwoman/Catwoman from a 1933 non-comic though... so I guess that it's completely off-topic.  

[F For Fake]

16 minutes ago, jason4 said:

I like this topic and I am on the side of embracing the realistic direction of art as of late. Check out this new art for DCeased coming fro. Shannon Maer:

I also like the fact that it's a not overly sexualized depiction of harley for once.

There's a whole thread about this cover over in the modern forum. Personally, I think that there's something jacked up with the anatomy, or the size of the head, or SOMETHING. It just isn't reading correctly to my eyes. Which is one problem with "realistic" covers: when they're close but not quite there, you get the uncanny valley effect. The end result: it's gross.

As to the OP's original question, no, I don't really care for "realistic" covers, however you want to parse that. I tend to like iconographic comic storytellers like Kirby. When comic art tends towards the more illustrative, ala Neal Adams and "The Studio" artists of the 70's, it loses my interest. Alex Ross paints beautiful portraits, but his storytelling has very little energy to it. Simplifying images makes it easier to imbue them with kinetic energy and motion. Scott McCloud has written extensively about this in his Understanding Comics works. He's much smarter than I am, so I'd recommend searching those volumes out, as they explain my point much better than I am accomplishing here. My point is: "realistic" comics are dull comics. If we're strictly talking about the covers, that doesn't matter so much, I suppose, because a cover is a static image and not a story, at least not usually. But the classic covers alluded to above did a great job of grabbing the eye and creating interest in the story. I don't see how these can possibly be separated. They're comic BOOKS. They're meant to be read, or at least they were, once upon a time.

As for Artgerm specifically, no, I don't care for his stuff. For one thing, it doesn't look all that "realistic" to me. It definitely has an cartoony slant to it. But his covers all look the same to my eyes, pretty much. Skilled artist, but just not my bag.

[Get Marwood & I]

2 hours ago, FSF said:

The point of the thread is very simple.  Do you like the increasing new style of art or not?  I suppose that as an extension of that is whether it is even appropriate to consider it comic art at this point though this part was not obvious.  Beyond that, there is no objective or agenda or any other consideration.  I'm just curious what the audience thinks of this pretty significant shift in what is being defined as "comic art."  As far any notion that I'm upset, that is completely absurd.  Feel free to post whatever you want and lots of threads get derailed so I get that and am guilty of it myself from time to time but I still don't understand this need to focus on the stories and even more so, the talk of "captions" as if there were that many books that actually even used them on the cover even before the modern era.  And regarding any sort of notion that I think Artgerm or any other books that I buy are going to be valuable is completely laughable.  I'm well entrenched in the camp that thinks that virtually all comic books will be essentially worthless sometime before i die.  I'm in my mid 40s if that helps.  I don't do comics, or any collectibles, for money.

Thanks for the clarification. I don't like the increase, no. Some of the art looks lovely in its way, and would be nice as a poster or print, but I don't think it's art that sits well with the medium myself. 

[FSF]

27 minutes ago, Copman said:

No one's going to take you seriously after this comment.

Educate yourself: https://www.comics.org

I think you need the education. What I stated is complete fact.  It's not even debatable if you are referring to the use of captions.

If you are referring to the part about focusing on stories, I'm talking about for the purposes of this thread and not the medium itself.  Of course comic books need stories.  Otherwise, they'd just be prints for viewing. 

[bc]

7 minutes ago, FSF said:

I think you need the education. What I stated is complete fact.  It's not even debatable if you are referring to the use of captions.

If you are referring to the part about focusing on stories, I'm talking about for the purposes of this thread and not the medium itself.  Of course comic books need stories.  Otherwise, they'd just be prints for viewing. 

Can you define "caption" ? I think we are missing something.

Most comic books utilized several cover "text boxes" to prelude the contents.

Do you consider the text "Do strange sinister creatures walk among us.....in Human form?" on this cover a caption?

Or is the text bubble "It is too late now Harris!! For You, there is no turning back!" a caption?

If these aren't captions - can you provide an example?

(two random covers from my collection)

Thanks,

-bc

 

 

 

 

[Andahaion]

Jenny Frison has stated that when asked to do a cover she is very rarely relayed any information about the story.  Not sure this is a good or bad thing, but I think helps add some context about the real world issues and may offer insight as to why these types of covers do not usually have anything to do with the story.  I really like her work. I also like the covers of yesteryear.  Good art is good art, and comes in many forms. 

[the blob]

Does anyone know if these covers computer generated? or largely computer generated and the artist comes in and does some touch up?

 

I assume Ross does a lot of projections and photo references and such, but they're all painted by hand as he has been doing for decades?

[Andahaion]

1 minute ago, the blob said:

Does anyone know if these covers computer generated? or largely computer generated and the artist comes in and does some touch up?

 

I assume Ross does a lot of projections and photo references and such, but they're all painted by hand as he has been doing for decades?

The cover I own (posted above) is produced in several stages.  She does a simple line drawing in pencil, then scans and prints that onto a new bristol board.  She then does the grayscale you see in the picture by hand using graphite, chalk, acrylic.  She then scans that and finishes the color digitally.  Here is a pic of the finished cover:

 

[FSF]

1 hour ago, bc said:

Can you define "caption" ? I think we are missing something.

Most comic books utilized several cover "text boxes" to prelude the contents.

Do you consider the text "Do strange sinister creatures walk among us.....in Human form?" on this cover a caption?

 

I was referring to the bubble captions of conversation. 

[DavidTheDavid]

Style and trend aren't the same thing. I'm unconvinced that this is a trend. Pinups, which is essentially what Artgerm is doing and @Turtle discussed, certainly aren't new. There are GGA collectors here who go nuts for busty 40s and 50s covers; what's wrong with modern readers liking the modern equivalent?

Back to my main point, I don't think Artgerm represents a trend. Of all the covers I see each Wednesday at my LCS, the shelves aren't littered with these. I do see lots of throw-back and homage covers, which I really enjoy. His stuff is popular. It must sell well. It's not really my thing, but hey, to each his own. Seems like he's good for the hobby as far as I can tell.

[the blob]

1 hour ago, Andahaion said:

The cover I own (posted above) is produced in several stages.  She does a simple line drawing in pencil, then scans and prints that onto a new bristol board.  She then does the grayscale you see in the picture by hand using graphite, chalk, acrylic.  She then scans that and finishes the color digitally.  Here is a pic of the finished cover:

 

That looks like it was done by hand. I was curious about the artgerm type covers that look like photographs "but not quite"...

[Andahaion]

58 minutes ago, the blob said:

That looks like it was done by hand. I was curious about the artgerm type covers that look like photographs "but not quite"...

Yes, it looks hand finished but I assure you the colors are digital. 

A cursory Google search seems to pull up several videos on YouTube concerning Artgerm’s process. Look there.